"Day of Judgment, Day of Wonders" August 12, 2018 AM

Let's go to the Lord together in prayer. Oh God, you are a gracious God.

You are long -suffering, full of kindness, slow to anger, forgiving iniquity.

And you are a just God, holy in your nature, wrathful in your glory, just in all you do.

God, I ask that you would instill in our hearts a growing reverence for you.

And we would fear you as you command us to in the scriptures.

We would not be casual about you, our creator, the one who made us, designed us, and called us to live for your glory.

We would not be casual about you, for you have sent us your only begotten son to die under your wrath on the cross.

Let us not be casual about you, our God. For your spirit who gives life and breath to everything in this world, he indwells your people.

He indwells us as a holy temple on this earth. Let us not be casual,

Father. For you have told us by your spirit in the scriptures that you will soon send your son, who is king of kings and lord of lords, and who will bring to a conclusion, a just and righteous conclusion, this world.

So, Father, we ask that you would give us a true reverence this morning as we as we look at the scriptures, as we look carefully for Christ here in Jeremiah.

Give us eyes to see and ears to hear what your word says.

We pray for these mercies, looking only to Jesus Christ, the one with whom you are well pleased.

Amen. Well, I invite you to open your Bibles and turn with me to Jeremiah chapter 21.

Jeremiah 21 21. We'll be reading verses 1 through 14 in a moment.

It's important to understand that we begin a section, a small section in Jeremiah where the kings, the latter kings of Judah are all addressed by God.

Each one of them is called out. Each one of them is called to account for their people for the things that they are doing.

And it begins with Zedekiah. He is the sitting king. He is the last king to oversee

Jerusalem before the walls crumble, before the city is burned. He is the last king on the throne.

But after we hear about Zedekiah, then we are going to hear about Jehoahaz, also known as Shalem.

We're going to hear about Jehoiakim and Jehoiakin, also known as Keniah. And we're going to hear about these kings and what

God thinks about their reigns. But after all these last kings are considered, all those that followed the good king

Josiah, these evil kings that presided over the end of Jerusalem, after we hear each one of these kings, then comes the last king in review.

And he is called a righteous branch. For he is the true seed of David and his throne is an everlasting throne.

So that's the section we're in. We're going to hear about four evil kings and then we're going to hear about the great king. Let's keep that in mind as we turn to the wicked king

Zedekiah and the last day of his reign, a day of wonder, is a day of judgment. Will you please stand with me in reverence to Christ, who was revealed in Jeremiah 21, verses 1 through 14.

The word which came to Jeremiah from the Lord when King Zedekiah sent to him, Pasture, the son of Micaiah, and Zephaniah, the priest, the son of Messiah, saying,

Please inquire of the Lord on our behalf, for Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, is warring against us.

Perhaps the Lord will deal with us according to all his wonderful acts, so that the enemy will withdraw from us.

Then Jeremiah said to them, You shall say to Zedekiah as follows, Thus says the

Lord God of Israel, Behold, I am about to turn back the weapons of war, which are in your hands, with which you are warring against the king of Babylon and the

Chaldeans who are besieging you outside the wall, and I will gather them into the center of this city. I myself will war against you with an outstretched hand and a mighty arm, even in anger and wrath and great indignation.

I will also strike down the inhabitants of this city, both man and beast, and they will die of a great pestilence.

Then afterwards, declares the Lord, I will give over Zedekiah, king of Judah, and his servants and the people, even those who survive in the city, from the pestilence, the sword, and the famine, into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, and into the hand of their foes, and into the hand of those who seek their lives, and he will strike them down with the edge of the sword.

He will not spare them, nor have pity or compassion. You shall also say to this people, thus says the

Lord, behold, I set before you the way of life and the way of death.

He who dwells in this city will die by the sword and by famine and by pestilence, but he who goes out and falls away to the

Chaldeans who are besieging, you will live, and he will have his own life as booty.

For I have set my face against this city for harm and not for good, declares the

Lord. It will be given into the hand of the king of Babylon, and he will burn it with fire.

Then say to the household of the king of Judah, hear the word of the Lord, O house of David. Thus says the

Lord, administer justice every morning, and deliver the person who has been robbed from the power of his oppressor, that my wrath may not go forth like fire and burn with none to extinguish it because of the evil of their deeds.

Behold, I am against you, O valley dweller, O rocky plain, declares the Lord. You men who say, who will come down against us, or who will enter into our habitations, but I will punish you according to the results of your deeds, declares the

Lord, and I will kindle a fire in its forest that it may devour all its environs.

And this is the word of the Lord. You may be seated. The apostles of Jesus Christ assure us we live in the last days.

Paul says that we are those upon whom the ends of the ages have come.

The apostle John says it is the last hour. And these last days seem to be filled with confusion.

It seems to be filled with great conflict, contention.

There seems to be a great deal of corruption in these last days that confuses what this world is all about, and who we are, and what we're to be all about.

The devil's puppet show with all of its special effects either keeps us so entertained or so distracted that none of us go out to the window to look at the storm that is on the horizon.

But if we could get a clear view of that storm, our priorities for ourselves and our families and those we know would be drastically different.

And this is the blessing of passages in the Bible that speak of judgment.

A day of judgment. A final kind of judgment. For these are windows that let us have a clear view of the storm that is coming.

Don't you know that whatever you are doing, oh fellow Oklahomans, whatever you are doing, when the tornado siren goes off and the warnings come, there is a tornado touching down right in your neighborhood.

Whatever you are doing, your priorities change. It's a clarifying moment.

This is a clarifying moment to think about the judgment that is declared when

Zedekiah inquires of the Lord what is going on. God's answer to these last days is the last day.

It brings great clarity to all the confusion that we live through.

Certainty of judgment fires our crucible of faith. That is why the message of judgment is retained.

That is why the judgment is such a strong theme, not just in the Old Testament, but also in the New Testament.

Because certainty of judgment fires our crucible of faith. I want us to see this morning how

Zedekiah's desperation is answered by God's denouncement and consider why he's asking the question he's asking and what

God has to say about it. So in verses 1 and 2, let's look at Zedekiah's inquiry of the

Lord. The word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord when King Zedekiah sent to him

Paschur, son of Malkijah, and Zephaniah the priest, the son of Messiah, saying, Please inquire of the

Lord on our behalf. For Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, is warring against us. Perhaps the

Lord will deal with us according to all his wonderful acts so that the enemy will withdraw from us.

Judah's in bad shape. Judah's on her deathbed. Her body is riddled with the poison of her own self -inflicted idolatry.

And the grim reaper, in the form of the king of Babylon, is pounding on the front door.

This is very bleak. This is the end. But it looked the same way 140 years ago.

The king then was Hezekiah. And the grim reaper was there in the form of Sennacherib, king of Assyria.

And he was pounding on the front door. And Hezekiah sent some holy men to the reigning prophet of that day.

His name was Isaiah. And asked, Will you pray to the Lord? And maybe God will deliver us from this great enemy.

And the Lord did deliver his people from that great enemy. The angel of the Lord came down and slew 185 ,000 troops of the

Assyrians. And Sennacherib was turned back. Hezekiah is hoping for a similar story.

He's hoping for a repeat. And yet, the humble repentance, the ardent worship, the zeal for God that was present in Hezekiah and his men, is hauntingly absent from Zedekiah and his holy men.

In fact, pastor Ben Malkijah, that's not the same pastor of chapter 20. This guy called for Jeremiah's execution for preaching the way he preached.

No matter that the Babylonians are at the gates, prepare to tear down the walls.

Before they get here, let's execute Jeremiah for preaching the way he preaches. The other guys,

Zephaniah, he ultimately was executed for his failure to follow through on God's commandments.

To, in other words, to submit to the judgment that God brought through Babylon.

God told them to to seek the welfare of the city to which you will be exiled. You be a help to those, even if they are those who are oppressing you and exiling you, seek to be a help to them.

But Zephaniah was so against that idea that he was part of the resistance that Nebuchadnezzar eventually put to death and executed.

So these are not men who are interested in Jeremiah's message. These are men who are against the word of the Lord. Yet Zedekiah sends them and he's hoping that somehow

God will intervene and rescue them from this horrible atrocity about to occur.

But Zedekiah should have known better. I want to give Zedekiah the benefit of the doubt. Maybe he only had yes men around him, only saying what he wanted to hear so that the word of God could never penetrate.

But Zedekiah, Zedekiah should know better. He's a puppet king. Nebuchadnezzar himself had taken this man whose name was

Mataniah, renamed him Zedekiah and put him on the throne. He was a puppet king.

He was only there to replace his foolish nephew who had rebelled. So the king of Babylon basically owns

Zedekiah and Zedekiah foolishly decides to rebel. And now the consequences are at the front gate.

And so he tries to appeal to God. Hey, can you get us out of this?

Forgetting that the Lord God owned Zedekiah as well. And long before Zedekiah ever broke trust with Nebuchadnezzar, he had rebelled against the king of the universe.

And now he's asking the king of the universe for help. He might as well send a message to Nebuchadnezzar and say, hey, can you help us out of this siege?

Zedekiah should have known better. And yet he asks. He asks for help.

But he seems to be tone deaf to God's word. If you remember the story of Jonah, the king of Nineveh did a lot better.

He covered himself and all his people and all the animals in sackcloth. A sign of humble repentance before a holy, all -powerful

God. But Zedekiah's approach is far more casual. It seems that he's saying something along these lines.

The Lord is great for getting us out of trouble. What's the harm in trying? I mean, desperate times call for half -hearted religious measures.

Maybe God perhaps will deliver us. The real question is, how many other gods did

Zedekiah ask before he asked the Lord God? And if this didn't work out, how many other gods was he going to ask in a row?

God had already given his answer about the certainty of the judgment. You can read that for yourself in Jeremiah 11, 11 through 14.

There would be no deliverance. It would be a day of judgment and a day of wonders against Judah. So let's look at this approaching doom.

The approaching doom upon the king and upon his people in verses 3 through 10. This is a message not just for Zedekiah and Judah, but for all of us.

It's not the answer. It's not the answer Zedekiah wants. But it's needful.

Verses 3 through 7 is God's message to Zedekiah. He will strike down the inhabitants of this city, both man and beast, and they will die of a great pestilence.

Then afterwards, declares the Lord, I will give over Zedekiah, king of Judah, and his servants and the people, even those who survive in this city, from the pestilence, the sword, and the famine, into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, and into the hand of their foes, into the hand of those who seek their lives.

And he will strike them down with the edge of the sword. He will not spare them nor have pity nor compassion.

You know, there was a time when God talked about fighting for Israel against their enemies.

That he would turn back the weapons of their enemies, that God would personally fight for them.

But now, it's the reverse, isn't it? He's talking about taking sides with Israel's enemies and personally fighting against Israel, fighting against Jerusalem, fighting against Judah.

God's answer to Zedekiah must have been hot enough to melt his ears. Wonders? You want to see wonders?

I'll show you wonders. I'll make your armies wondrously fail and your enemies wondrously succeed.

I'll pour out wondrous disasters upon you, pestilence, sword, and famine. I will personally go to war against you with all my wondrous anger, wrath, and indignation.

Your fate will be extermination or exile. Nebuchadnezzar is my merciless hammer and my word, a pitiless anvil.

Prepare for the wondrous beating. That's not the answer

Zedekiah wanted to hear. But then God has a message for those in Jerusalem.

Verses 8 and 9 and 10. You shall say to this people, you shall also say to this people, these are the people living in Jerusalem, thus says the

Lord, behold, I set before you the way of life and the way of death. He who dwells in this city will die by the sword and by famine and by pestilence.

But he who goes out and falls away to the Chaldeans, who are besieging you, will live and he will have his own life as booty.

For I have set my face against this city for harm and not for good, declares the Lord. It will be given into the hand of the king of Babylon and he will burn it with fire.

God is addressing covenant breakers and so, and so he addresses them in covenant language.

I set before you the way of life and the way of death. At the end of Deuteronomy, as Moses is summing up all that God has to say to Israel and the way that they're supposed to live, he says it like this.

Deuteronomy 30 verse 19. I call heaven and earth to witness against you today that I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse.

So choose life in order that you may live. Israel chose death. They chose to disobey

God. They chose to go against the covenant that God laid before them. They rejected the message of the

Messiah and now they're under judgment. Now when Moses said life and death, when he meant life, he said, you know, walk in the way of God's covenant.

Walk in the way of his instruction and you will know life. Now Jeremiah uses the same expression, life and death, and it's like this.

You can either submit willingly to the judgment of God's exile or you can resist and choose the judgment of extermination.

And again, the message is choose life that you may live. Why is

God being so harsh? Recall that they have broken the covenant. Breaking the covenant is not like breaking the speed limit.

It's like trying to overthrow the government and failing. And they have repeatedly tried to overthrow the government of God.

They have failed and now they face exile or extermination, which is the only thing you do with those who failed to overthrow a government.

This is their punishment. This is their doom. I'm curious why any

Jew would want to take the first option. Why go into exile? I mean, why live in a world where Jerusalem is burnt to the ground?

Where the temple is destroyed? Why would you live in a world where there's no more ark of the covenant?

No more altar in the courtyard of the temple. No more priesthood offering up the daily sacrifice.

No more Levites leading the people in corporate worship and singing the psalms there in the temple.

Why would you want to live in a world where there was no Jerusalem and no temple? And why would you want to live in a world where a descendant of David was no longer on the throne?

Why would you want to live in that world? And why would you want to live in a world where you couldn't live in the promised land?

Where you couldn't live in the land that God promised to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. That was ultimately conquered first by Joshua and then again by David.

Why would you want to live off in Babylon somewhere instead of living in the promised land?

Better to die than live in a world like that. And many of them felt that way.

Answering that question, we'll save for the end. Notice the affronting deeds in verses 11 through 14.

Not only the approaching doom, but the affronting deeds. God will bring doom because of how they have lived.

Notice God's message to David's house in verses 11 and 12. Then to say to the household of the king of Judah, Hear the word of the

Lord, O house of David. Thus says the Lord. Administer justice every morning and deliver the person who has been robbed from the power of his oppressor that my wrath may not go forth like fire and burn with no one to extinguish it because of the evil of their deeds.

So first to Zedekiah, but then to David's royal house. A focus on the king himself, but then a bit of an expansion upon all the royal household of David.

Did it really matter? Did it really matter how David's household conducted themselves? I mean, after all, didn't

God promise David that there would always be one of his descendants sitting on the throne and the throne would never fail?

Didn't he promise that there would always be a lamp in Jerusalem? And this gives everyone a feeling of security.

After all, if there always has to be a descendant of David upon the throne, the throne is in Jerusalem, then

Jerusalem will never fall. But we're okay. It's never going to happen,

Jeremiah. You're preaching heresy when you say that Jerusalem's going to be destroyed and that we're all going to die.

But God says, repent. Turn away from the injustice or God's wrath like fire will consume the house of David.

In particular, Zedekiah and his household were complicit in massive injustice there in Jerusalem. They were no longer following God's commands about the

Sabbath year. You know the Sabbath day, seventh day. What about the Sabbath year, the seventh year?

All sorts of people would get in trouble financially. They would have hard times and they would become other people's slaves or servants.

They would sell themselves out as slaves or as servants. Their property would go to other people and they would live this life until the seventh year when the slaves were to be set free.

No longer are you going to be working for me. You're a free person. You're a free man with your family.

Go and do what you need to do. You're no longer my property. The seventh year.

But the royal household had stopped following that law. They perpetuated the slavery well beyond the seventh year, beyond the

Sabbath year. And this was a cause of great injustice in their land. There was never to be perpetual, generational slavery.

Never. Someone had a hard time, had to work for a while, but then they'd be back on their feet in the seventh year.

But these men of the royal household did not follow that and then they led the whole nation to follow suit.

And so God confronted them and like any good politician they made a big show of repenting.

Of changing their ways. And they had a big ceremony in which they had a covenant ceremony.

And they cut animals in half and put them on either side and walked before it saying, may

God do this to us if we fail to go through with getting rid of this abominable practice.

And you can read all about it in Jeremiah 34. You also read about how they didn't follow through on their promises.

And even though they said they would release the slaves, they didn't. And they held on to them. And you can tell that there is just, there's no repentance in their life.

You can be hard pressed to find anybody in David's household wearing sackcloth and ashes. They're not repenting.

They're not turning back to the Lord. They are perpetuating the injustice. And so God has a message for them.

And warns them of the burning of their household with fire. And he has a message to all the Jews of the land.

Verses 13 and 14. And so the

Jews sensing that the time for their disaster, the time for their national economic social collapse was near.

The Jews had a healthy portion of them who became preppers. And so they went out into caves in the valley and up on high on the high rocky plains and they were hiding out.

They had all their supplies and their weapons and saying, oh, you know, they're never gonna take us. We're fine out here.

After all, we're in the promised land. So we're gonna hold out. God says, no, I see you.

I see where you're hiding. I see you in the valley and I see you on the mountaintops and you're not going to get away from judgment either. Because your entire idolatrous force is going to be burned down with fire.

All those little wooden isles that you have sticking up all over the place. I'm going to burn them all down with fire. All those hills upon which there's a tree under which you commit immorality and idolatry.

All of it's going to be burned down. That was his message to the Jews in the land.

And so it is. That we have the word fire three times.

Nebuchadnezzar is going to burn the city with fire. God's wrath like fire is going to burn up the household of David.

And he's going to burn the land with fire. What are they losing? What we said earlier.

The city would fall, the throne would be empty and the land would be lost. And that's

God's answer to Zedekiah's desperate question. God, will you help us out?

God, will you turn them back? No. Everything you hold dear is going to be burned with fire.

That's the answer. And so there is great opportunity. Great opportunity for those who will survive.

Because certainty of judgment fires our crucible of faith. Faith is purified by fire.

I want you to look back with me at verses eight and nine. Verses eight and nine.

Let's look at this again. You shall also say to this people, thus says the Lord, behold, I set before you the way of life and the way of death.

He who dwells in this city will die, will die by the sword and by famine and by pestilence.

But he who goes out and falls away to the Chaldeans who are besieging you will live. And he will have his life, his own life, as booty.

As soon as God makes the choice between life and death clear to his people, he then, in verses 10, 12, and 14, tells them what will be burned with fire.

Jerusalem with its temple, the house of David, and the whole promised land. And again, we come back to the question, why would any

Jew want to surrender to these awful pagan Babylonians? Why would anyone want to, as it says, fall away to the

Chaldeans like a traitor? And live in an exile in Babylon?

Why would they want to live without their holy city and without a Davidic king and without their promised land?

Wouldn't it be better to die than live on without these covenant promises, without these covenant blessings?

What do they have left to believe? What hope do they have? Who should they trust?

Who should they follow? Where are they going to find life? These are important questions that only arise because the city and the throne and the land are overthrown in fire.

These questions are not even brought up until these are gone. Once they're gone, then the questions come.

Once the prospect of these things being gone, once the certainty of judgment is made clear, then we begin to ask the questions.

What is this other than the subtraction of idols? This is the subtraction of idols.

The fire of God's judgment purified the faith of the remnant as he subtracted all of the idols out of their existence.

Yes, that included Molech, the queen of heaven, and Baal, but also it included the city with its temple, the throne, and the land.

We need to remember that Judah's spiritual condition had deteriorated to such a degree that temple worship was just that, worshiping the temple.

And that there was this cult that rose up around the temple.

In Jeremiah 7 -4, their message was simply this, the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, the temple of the

Lord. They were all about the temple, but not about the Lord. They were all convinced that anybody who would say that there would be no more

Davidic king on the throne, that that person should be executed for their treason, that Jeremiah should die for preaching that way.

They were all about the throne of David, but they weren't about the God of David.

This land was given to us. It is a land flowing with milk and honey. It's an everlasting possession.

We'll never lose it. And so the prophets, the false prophets, proof -texted their sermons with all kinds of promises of peace, peace, when there was no peace, and they tried to heal the wounds of the people superficially.

This is the background, Jeremiah 6, 7, and 8. So, those in the city, they were trusting they would be spared because Jerusalem is

Jerusalem and isn't God all about Jerusalem and its temple. But they're not safe. Those of David's lineage may trust that they would be spared because, hey,

David is David and isn't God all about David and his lineage, but they're not safe. Those living throughout the land and the valleys and on the hills may trust that they will be spared because the land is the land and isn't

God all about the land and its eternal status, but they're not safe. All their idols, the city, the throne, and the land will be burned with fire.

And that's remarkable because the city, the land, and the lineage, the

Davidic lineage, those are critical to the covenants that God made with Abraham and Israel and David.

And what had God promised Abraham, Israel, and David except these, dominion and dynasty, a land to rule, and a ruling lineage, and both captured by the image of a city in which the kings rule at the heart of the land itself, the city.

No wonder the spirit says that Abraham, by faith, was looking for the city. The city encapsulates all the promises that God made to Abraham because in that city his descendants would live and rule over the land that he promised to him.

And so that's why Abraham's looking for a city because the city is the culmination of all of the covenant promises

God made. And so he's looking for the city without foundations whose architect and builder is

God. Hebrews 11 verse 10. And we read in Hebrews 11 that Abraham was a stranger and an exile on the earth.

And that he died in faith without receiving the promises, but it says that he saw them and he greeted them from afar.

And in fact, Jesus himself says in John 8 that Abraham rejoiced to see

Christ's day and he saw it and he was glad. And so as Abraham had a full and vibrant gospel faith in Christ while in exile with no city, with no throne, and no land, so also the remnant in exile will have their faith purified by fire.

And though they have no city, and though they have no throne, and though they have no land, they still have Christ.

They still have Christ. They still have the Messiah in whom all the promises are fulfilled.

This is crucial for us that all the promises, all the blessings of God that they and we so often turn into idols, gone by fire.

Gone by fire. So as to clarify what they should trust, whom they should follow, and where they would find their life, it is in Jesus Christ.

All you need to turn true religion into idolatrous superstition is simply this, eclipse the glory of Christ.

And where Christ's types and shadows are made Lord and Savior, his gospel is denied.

And so we turn to the supremacy of Christ. Quite a lot of names were read for us earlier in Nehemiah.

Do you realize that as we read Jeremiah 21, it says that everybody, everybody who stayed in the city, who decided to resist to the end, who said it's not worth living in a world where we don't have the city, the throne, or the land, all of those who remained in the city chose the way of death, and they all died.

They all died by the sword, by famine, and by pestilence. They all died. So who are these names that we're reading about in Nehemiah?

They are the children of those who chose life, who listened to the word of the

Lord, and said, I choose life. God is just, God is right,

God is good. And he says embrace this exile. We'll embrace the exile.

And they left the condemned city, the city of destruction.

And they left and became strangers and exiles in the world.

And held on to God's promises by faith. And their descendants returned, and we see all of their names.

We don't remember, we are not given hardly any of the names of the people who died in that city, in Jerusalem, who chose the way of death.

We're told just a handful of names of those who died in the city. And how many of the names do we hear who chose the way of life and their descendants who returned?

It tells us something about God's promises. It tells us something about God setting out the way of life.

As we consider the supremacy of Christ, remember this, the Jew in this scenario in Jeremiah 21, in this historical moment, the

Jew is considering two things hearing the message of Jeremiah. It's this, first, considering the fiery destruction of everything that he or she has trusted in.

And then also considering the way of escape, which means, which means, loss of self -rule and embracing a life of exile.

And honestly, every single one of us face the same kind of choice. Holding on to everything we thought would save us from destruction or rather than seeking to save our lives, we lose it for the sake of Christ, who is

King of Kings, for the sake of the gospel. Those are the two choices.

Those are the options, the way of death versus the way of life. You see,

God warns us of judgment, so this would click, so that we would be clear on the gospel.

If there was no judgment, if there is no judgment, if there is no great day of judgment, there is no clarity to the gospel.

Everyone who wants to deny the last judgment of God, the judgment of Jesus Christ, everyone who wants to to move that kind of language out of Christian expression, will also take with it the gospel itself.

In 2 Peter chapter 3, in verse 3, it says, Notice, first of all, that in the last days, mockers will come with their mocking, following after their own lusts and saying,

Where is the promise of his coming? For ever since the father's fell asleep, all continues just as it was from the beginning of creation.

But when they maintain this, it escapes their notice that by the word of God, the heavens existed long ago and the earth was formed out of water and by water, through which the world at that time was destroyed, being flooded with water.

For by his word, the present heavens and earth are being reserved for fire, kept for the day of judgment and the destruction of ungodly men.

We live in the last days full of mockers and scoffers who say, judgment will never happen because it never has happened.

And they deny that God ever flooded the world. Why? Because they're mockers, following after their own lusts.

The lesson of the flood of Noah teaches us about the return of Jesus Christ, that all will be set right by fire.

Fire, the fire that burned Jerusalem, the fire that would burn up the household of David, the fire that would burn the land.

This fire is all about moving out of the way all of the idols. None of that will matter, none of that will last.

So what if you lived in Jerusalem and saw the temple and held holy artifacts in your hand?

So what if you were from the lineage of David? So what if you lived in the promised land? All of that is burned by fire.

You don't get saved from that. So what if you come to church? So what if your membership is on a church roll somewhere?

So what if you've read your Bible 50 times? So what? All of that's burned with fire. There's only one person, only one righteousness, only one gospel, and you gotta hold to Jesus Christ.

Only he will save you in the end. Only he will save you. Don't listen to anything else.

There's a day of judgment coming, a day of fire. Everyone who tells you different is a mocker, following their own lusts, and they don't care about you.

They care about themselves. It's a day of fire. And God calls you to the way of life, verses 8 and 9.

2 Peter 3, but do not let this one fact escape your notice, beloved, that with the

Lord one day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years is like one day. And the Lord is not slow about his promises. Some count slowness, but is patient towards you, not wishing for any to perish, but for all to come to repentance.

God sets before you the way of life and the way of death. It makes it clear.

And Shiloh has come, the one to whom it all belongs. So don't look to Israel, and don't look to the law, and don't look to sacrifices.

You look to Christ. And don't let anyone ever put anything in front of Jesus Christ, his person and work.

Don't let them eclipse his glory. Have you clarified your faith?

Have you clarified it? It's a day of judgment coming. It's a day of fire. Have you clarified your faith?

For many people, God is the grease that keeps the gears of life in good working order. Yeah, I'm good with God, because God makes my life good.

Until life is not good. Then comes the question, what good is God? Zedekiah treated

God like a fire extinguisher. Kept in its place, separate from your existence until you need him.

Break glass in case of emergency. What are you trusting?

It's a fearful thing to preach. Listen. What I'm hanging my eternal destiny on, is what

I'm telling you. When Jesus came up out of the water, the heavens parted, and the

Holy Spirit, in the form of a dove, descended in the light of the one Christ. And the voice came from heaven.

It was the voice of the Heavenly Father. And he said, this is my beloved son, with whom I am well pleased.

That's what I'm hanging everything on, for my eternal destiny. It's Jesus Christ, that the

Father is well pleased with him. Christ's righteousness, not my own. And I stand before you, and I preach this, because I'm staking my eternity on it.

And I want you to do the same. I wouldn't preach anything to you, that I wasn't hanging my eternal destiny on.

And the final question for us this morning is this, is judgment still applicable for the believer?

I mean, the message of judgment, we talk about hell, and the final judgment. I mean, does that have anything to do with those who already know

Christ, and love him, and follow him? Yes. You notice in 2nd

Peter, verse 8. Peter says, beloved, I'm talking to you, saints.

Talking to you, those loved of God. You see, everything is put into its proper place.

All quandaries seen in their proper light. All your decisions made easier.

All your relationships made more meaningful. Worship made serious. Holiness made attractive.

When judgment's on the horizon, Christ will come back certainly, suddenly, and soon.

For those who were in Christ, we fear no condemnation whatsoever. But as we recognize, as we live in these last days, as we anticipate the last day, and the arrival of our master, everything is put into proper perspective.

We're preparing for a visit. You know what it's like when someone's going to come visit you?

You've got to make things ready. The Hebrew word for judgment is pachad, meaning visit.

Are we getting ready for the visit? Are we ready? 2

Peter 3, verses 10 through 14. But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, in which the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the elements will be destroyed with intense heat, and the earth and its works will be burned up.

Since all these things are going, are due to be destroyed in this way, what sort of people ought you to be in holy conduct and godliness?

Looking for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be destroyed by burning, and the elements will melt with intense heat.

But according to his promise, we are looking for new heavens and a new earth, in which righteousness dwells.

Therefore, beloved, since you look for these things, be diligent to be found in him, by him in peace, spotless, and blameless.

It just clarifies everything. Just clarifies everything. Should I or should

I not? Well, what will Christ find me doing when he comes back?

How should I or shouldn't I? Our decisions, our relationships, how we, how we engage in our, and even our spiritual disciplines, and following after God.

The way we use our time and our resources, everything is, is, is clarified by this fact.

Jesus is about to come back. What's he going to find us doing? What's he going to find us doing?

Let's pray. Father, I thank you for the time you've given us this morning. You have set before us the way of life and the way of death.

You do this, you did this for, for Judah, as their nation was about to fall.

And you set it before us, as the curtain of history is about to fall.

This, Father, clarify for us, those who, who love

Christ and those who are wondering about Christ, clarify for us what we are to believe, what we are hanging on to.

Here's so much that will be burned up with fire. So much that won't matter.

So much that will falsely assure far too many. God, I pray for each person who is here this morning.

If anything else, just, Father, I pray that you would clarify their faith in Christ and clarify if they need to turn to Christ to trust in him alone.